B-CC’s Language lab

B-CC’s new, state-of-the-art language lab is the first in Montgomery County public high schools. Teachers direct students at 32 work stations, each equipped with a flat-screen monitor and headset. It was Principal Katy Harvey and the faculty’s top priority for the school in 2003. Teachers Ivan Teelucksingh, Ann Hengerer, Beth Groeneman, and Melissa Magistro identified the educational need, helped research equipment options, and worked to ensure that the lab was designed to enhance B-CC’s language programs.

The B-CC High School Educational Foundation made funding the language lab its priority in FY2004. With help from B-CC parents, Jil Sneider and Lucy Swartz, as well as community leaders, most notably Robby Brewer and Carol Trawick, the Foundation raised $75,000 to make the lab a reality. Hundreds of B-CC parents, future parents, grandparents, friends, faculty, and alumni generously responded to our requests for individual donations. Area foundations, businesses, and B-CC High School student organizations helped put us over the top.

Ninety percent of B-CC’s students study at least one foreign language; many study two. In addition, the ESOL Department has about 80 to 100 students from more than 50 countries each year. Before the lab, students hardly had any time to speak for more than a few seconds in their language classes. Now students can perform oral drills with self-recording, hear voice playback, and practice conversations with each other. The lab also offers teachers the ability to create individualized lesson plans, to provide differentiated instruction, and to test oral comprehension more effectively and efficiently.

“With the lab, we have to talk more; we’re having many more discussions with each other, and you can hear the accents better,” said Kimberly Faure, a French Level 6 student.

Melissa Magistro, a Spanish teacher, echoes Kimberly: “The biggest asset is that students can hear themselves, record it, and play it back, then adjust their pronunciation and grammar. They self-correct. Kids are more focused.”

Newsletter

More Reading

The Foundation’s Campaign for Academic Excellence provides a continuum of year-round integrated academic support and enrichment programs that promote high academic standards and success for all students at B-CC High School.

Partnership with B-CC High School Since 1995

The Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School Educational Foundation was established in 1995 during a time of declining enrollment and deteriorating facilities at B-CC High School. The Foundation took on the charge to help improve school facilities, raise academic rigor, and re-engineer B-CC for the 21st Century

The Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School Educational Foundation was established in 1995 during a time of declining enrollment and deteriorating facilities at B-CC High School. The Foundation took on the charge to help improve school facilities, raise academic rigor, and re-engineer B-CC for the 21st Century.

By the summer of 2017, the Foundation has raised more than $2.7 million to meet that challenge and has been investing in academic excellence at B-CC High School for more than two decades. With new programs and a newly modernized facility that was completed in February 2002, B-CC’s enrollment, reflecting community confidence in the school, has been increasing steadily ever since, from 1,076 students in 1995 to 2,074 students in 2017.

The generosity of alumni, parents, faculty, students, businesses, and community members has made it possible for the Foundation to fund innovative academic support programs that promote high academic standards and support success for all B-CC students. In the process, the Foundation helped bring several “firsts” to B-CC High School: